Summary prepared by Fielding M. McGehee III. If you use this material, please credit The Jonestown Institute. Thank you.
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FBI Catalogue: Miscellaneous
FBI preliminary tape identification note: One Audio Magnetics 90/ “3/1974 Attempt to blow up bus” 3×5 card attached
Date cues on tape: 11 March 1974 (note on tape box of Q 611)
People named:
Marceline Jones
Michael Prokes (speaks)
Bible verses cited: None
Summary:
This tape is a recording made off the air of a Ukiah radio newscast about an attempted bombing of a Peoples Temple bus in San Francisco. Although 11 buses were parked at a junior high where the Temple was holding services, according to Temple spokesman Michael Prokes, the bomb had been planted under the bus used by Jim and Marceline Jones. The fuse had burned down to a “fraction of an inch,” and the fact that it hadn’t exploded was “really a miracle,” Prokes quoted an unnamed police detective as saying.
Note: A longer recording of this newscast – with two virtually identical stories about the attempted bombing (instead of just one on this tape) – appears at Q 611.
FBI Summary:
Date of transcription: 3/14/79
In connection with the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s investigation into the assassination of U.S. Congressman LEO J. RYAN at Port Kaituma, Guyana, South America, on November 18, 1978, a tape recording was obtained. This tape recording was located in Jonestown, Guyana, South America, and was turned over to U.S. Officials in Guyana and subsequently transported to the United States.
On March 6, 1979, Special Agent (name deleted) reviewed the tape numbered 1B47 #114. This tape was found to contain the following:
Side A: A two minute recording of a radio station KDO, Ukiah, California news cast, reporting a 1972 bomb attempt on a People’s Temple bus in San Francisco.
Side B: Blank.
Differences with FBI Summary:
The summary is generally accurate, although the radio station call letters are different and the date on the box in which a nearly-identical tape was found was two years later.
Tape originally posted June 2006